Month January 2017

New Orleans Pharmacy Museum

New Orleans Pharmacy Museum explores the history of medicine from leeches to voodoo and everything in between.

Medicine may be one of the most expressive examples of how society has progressed and improved over time. Doctors have done a lot of crazy and down right dangerous things in the attempt to heal people, whether their malady is real or perceived. When I asked a doctor friend "at what point in history was visiting a doctor more likely to help the patient than harm?" he didn't have to think hard. He immediately replied: with the invention of penicillin.

Read MoreNew Orleans Pharmacy Museum

The Great Gumbo Excursion

We didn't quite know what we were getting into when we ate that first bowl of gumbo. But then, the thought occurred to me...and I snapped a picture. Today, I regale you with the tail of our Great Gumbo Crawl.

The Great Gumbo Excursion was conceived at the House of Blues when we tasted their gumbo and wondered: is this legit? The broth was so brown, it seemed rice and sausage heavy with a shortage of shrimp and absence of other sea food. It was still delicious and the small appetizer bowl for $7 was an apt entry into the gumbo game. What else could we find and what other music? We had one night in New Orleans and we were going to spend it eating as much gumbo as we could.

Read MoreThe Great Gumbo Excursion

New Orleans

To top off the night, we wandered into the famous and very dilapidated Preservation Hall for some classic New Orleans Jazz.

After days on the road, it's time for a little rest and relaxation. By that, I mean, it's time for a shower. So, tonight we are splurging on a hotel. But it's more than just a shower that we are after because this hotel is along the French Quarter of New Orleans. Tonight, we will wander down Bourbon Street, delight in delicacies, and swoon to the music of the Big Easy.

Read MoreNew Orleans

The End of the Road

Driving through Natchez, along the Mississippi shoreline and the end (or beginning) of the Natchez Trace.

It has only been a few, cloudy days from Nashville to Natchez, but here we are. The Natchez Parkway ends just outside of Natchez, Mississippi but we continue through town for our first view of the Mississippi River. At the shore line, we meditate on tradition, history, and natural wonders along the Natchez Trace. We have traveled the entirety of the Natchez Trace Parkway.

Read MoreThe End of the Road

Emerald Mound

Many mounds dot the Natchez Trace, constructed by ancient stone age tribes. But none compare the the sheer size of the Emerald Mound.

The Mississippian Period Mound Builders perfected their art by 1250 AD when ancestors of the Natchez tribe began to sculpt a natural hill into the second largest Pre-Columbian earthwork in the country. Named after a 19th century plantation that surrounded the ancient earthworks, Emerald Mound's history represents what might as well have been another world. The mound's base stretches 770 by 435 feet. While the main portion of the mound is 35 feet high, two secondary mounds on top of the main body elevates it another 30 feet. Here was the cultural center of this region. Chieftain and cultural leaders lived in structures on the mound. Ceremonial rights were conducted here up until 1730s. The descendants of these Mound Builders, the Natchez, continued to use the mound until the late 1730s. By then, the Natchez had moved their ceremonial center 12 miles north to the Grand Village of the Natchez.

Read MoreEmerald Mound

Mount Locust Inn

Mount Locust Inn is one of the few remaining stands along the Natchez Trace.

By modern terms, the Mount Locust Inn is a modest structure with four small rooms for guests and the resident family. But in the days of the "Kaintucks" traveling along the Natchez Trace, Mount Locust Inn offered some of the finest accommodations a traveler could hope for.

Read MoreMount Locust Inn

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back. I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. BY ROBERT FROST

As late in the fall as it may have been, leaves the color of sunshine clung to the trees. The less tenacious littered the ground. This portion of the Natchez Trace is so worn by centuries of use that it is now a deep gully. We climbed down into the ancient footpath and looked up at the walls. They rose above our heads to flatten out at the natural ground level. This is a path so tied to tradition that to walk it literally blinds you to all other directions.

Read MoreThe Road Not Taken

Waylaid By Goats

Nothing is safe when a roving gang of goats blocks to road and wants the shirt of your back. Seriously, these guys will eat anything.

Today, we were waylaid by a gang of goats. After gaping at the limited remnants of Rocky Springs, we wandered to the Magnus Mound. Well we were headed in that way. We slowed to a stop while twenty unaccompanied goats blocked the road.

Read MoreWaylaid By Goats